Champion Beer of Britain

What a wonderful title and how proud the brewers are to win the coveted CAMRA Champion Beer of Britain which is awarded annually at the CAMRA Great British Beer Festival. However are CAMRA really making the most of this accolade? As a CAMRA member I love real ale and thoroughly enjoy trying different brews, but I'd certainly challenge them on their choice of winners in recent years.

I have no axe to grind over the winners themselves, they are all wonderful beers and very worthy of the title. However I do have a concern that CAMRA have chosen winners that are not very accessible to the general public.  Recently they tend to come from small micro's who just don't have the capacity or marketing knowhow to exploit the win. Arguably this is a loss for the general public and to CAMRA.

Last years winner was Coniston Brewery No9 Barley Wine. I did not have the pleasure of trying this beer and have never seen it at any of the regional beer festivals I've attended. What chance then do the general public have to try this wonderful brew. I think the point I'm making is that it would be great to see a commercially available beer chosen as the winner for once. This probably means it would be one of the established Regional Brewers ale brands who have the marketing muscle to maximise the win. The last beer of this type was possibly Castle Rock Harvest Pale Ale in 2010 or looking further back, more likely Caladonian Deuchars IPA.

Just imagine if a London Pride, Wadworth 6X or even dare I say it, a Greene King Abbot Ale from an established Regional were to win.  Or, perhaps  a beer from the more recent powerful micros/regionals such as Thornbridge or Butcombe. These brewers are all capable of getting a winning beer into the market place quickly and on a wide scale, where it can enjoyed by the mass market of real ale drinkers.

I believe in an ideal scenario CAMRA would want their flagship champion beer for the year to be available for as many people as possible to try. CAMRA's objective is to promote the sales of real ale, so what better way than to have their best beer on show. If the champion beer is on a bar I think more drinkers are likely to try it, switching from their regular drinks, which could recruit new drinkers to the real ale category.

 In conclusion I think it's quite marvellous that we now have so many more smaller brewers all brewing great beers and in many cases these are at least the equal of those produced by their larger established competitors. So I'm not sure what CAMRA do to resolve this as the competition is based on a blind tasting. I'm just hoping that for 2013 we see a beer win that more people will have the chance to enjoy. A contentious blog post perhaps, but I really do enjoy the GBBF and most of all want real ale to prosper and grow.